Sometimes when I have a cold I completely lose the capacity to taste for a couple days. One time, to test this, a guy I worked with dared me to taste the hottest hot sauce he had (I forget what it was called but it was in a REALLY tiny bottle). I took one drop and put it on my tongue and with the exception of a slight tingling sensation, I tasted nothing.

I cook for a living. I do like spicy food. My Dad raised me up between Texas and the Deep South, which means the Messicans had an influence in my life, as did the Coonass woman he married, so early on, I was exposed to a lot of peppers of various heats and persuasions. My chili at home I can't reproduce at the restaurant, because our clientele is far too pale and New Englandy to appreciate it, and even the Sriracha I use in a few dishes is a bit much for them.

I say this, as a preface, because I like spicy food. I cook spicy food. I enjoy spicy food, and given my druthers, I'll go with a nice hot curry, or spicy wings, or reach for the hot sauce on the table. It is perhaps, this background IN food and foodservice, that sort of baffles me with these sorts of "challenges." Because I like spicy food, that sort of means that I like it in context. In a jerk, in a chili, in a salsa, in a sauce, in a dish.

I've done some Four Alarm dishes, for the spice heads. I get folks who ask for an extra hot sauce for their wings, I break out the fun stuff, but the qualifier is that it's not just about heat, but about taste. You have to be able to have that heat in context with a dish, as opposed to just sitting there and rubbing pepper juice over yourself in some masochistic joining of the demiurge of spice. For me, the joy of spice and all that heat, is the play of flavors, yes, the endorphin rush, but also in the context with the food.

This? This is as asinine as the "Cinnamon Challenge" and seems about as much fun as getting a blast of CS gas just to get you used to the idea. Give me a salsa, give me a sauce, give me the heat in context, and let me enjoy the damn dish. You might as well be "testing" your limits by pouring lemon juice over cuts or squirting some in your eyes, for fun. Yeah, you can do it, I guess, but why the Hells would you want to?

I used to work there. Those flipping wings are the hottest thing I've had, so hot my teeth burned (if you can imagine that). Then a couple hours later, boom, hot liquid magma out my arse not once, not twice but thrice. Never again./i miss that food, but my waist line doesn't. fresh brisket out of the smoker is heavenly.

Solty Dog:I dislike the misuse of the word challenge. A challenge assumes some sort of a reward when successful. Pain is not a reward.

This goes for most internet challenges.

You fail at both the dictionary and understanding how pain works. But of course you are more than welcome to dislike pain-based challenges.

This was a very lame reaction. I cannot vouch for the purity they used, but the total effect of it was lame. Being OC Sprayed or eating a ghost pepper by itself is ridiculously more painful than what it looked like these morons put themselves through.

/have done both//would do again for the first time, would never opt to do either a second time.

Smackledorfer:Being OC Sprayed or eating a ghost pepper by itself is ridiculously more painful than what it looked like these morons put themselves through.

I have a small bag of ghost chilis in my cabinet. You know what I like to use them for? Hot chocolate. Boil the water with one chili. Use that with the hot chocolate mix. Nice, spicy flavor, doesn't really burn going in or coming out.

one crystal of 15 million is enough to make a pot of chili or soup so hot most people won't touch it.

Yeup. I read an article on the "Hot Sauce Blog" where the writer mixed a single granule of pure capsaicin with an entire pot of tomato soup and couldn't stand it. He let his wife try it, which led to the memorable line "she was unable to talk for several minutes, and when she finally did, she said something about divorce."

They ended up throwing the rest of the pot of soup away. It was too spicy for the guy who writes the Hot Sauce Blog.

One of the local radio personalities on KUPD here Phoenix ate a small amount of capsaicin. He threw up almost instantly from the heat and ended up getting burns around his mouth. Went to the ER for it. Not sure if these guys were eating the same thing. I guess everyone can have different reactions.

RodneyToady:Smackledorfer: Being OC Sprayed or eating a ghost pepper by itself is ridiculously more painful than what it looked like these morons put themselves through.

I have a small bag of ghost chilis in my cabinet. You know what I like to use them for? Hot chocolate. Boil the water with one chili. Use that with the hot chocolate mix. Nice, spicy flavor, doesn't really burn going in or coming out.

What the hell are you using the water for if you're making hot chocolate?

phoenixdan:One of the local radio personalities on KUPD here Phoenix ate a small amount of capsaicin. He threw up almost instantly from the heat and ended up getting burns around his mouth. Went to the ER for it. Not sure if these guys were eating the same thing. I guess everyone can have different reactions.

Huh. All this time I was led to believe that the reaction to capsaicin was basically physiological and no actual tissue damage occurred.

No, actually, they aren't. "pepper spray", what cops call Oleoresin Capsicum spray, is made with denatured alcohol and capsaicin. CS gas, "tear gas" is a synthetic chemical that is produced by a heat reaction and is in no way related to Capsaicin, and isn't even measured with Scoville units.

arcas:phoenixdan: One of the local radio personalities on KUPD here Phoenix ate a small amount of capsaicin. He threw up almost instantly from the heat and ended up getting burns around his mouth. Went to the ER for it. Not sure if these guys were eating the same thing. I guess everyone can have different reactions.

Huh. All this time I was led to believe that the reaction to capsaicin was basically physiological and no actual tissue damage occurred.

Early research showed capsaicin to evoke a strikingly long-onset current in comparison to other chemical agonists, suggesting the involvement of a significant rate-limiting factor. Subsequently, the VR1 has been shown to be a member of the superfamily of, and as such is now referred to as http://www.genenames.org/data/hgnc_data.php?match=TRPV1" style="text-decoration: none; color: rgb(102, 51, 102); background-image: url(data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAoAAAAKCAYAAACNMs+9 AAAAVElEQVR42n3PgQkAIAhEUXdqJ3dqJ3e6IoTPUSQcgj4EQ5IlUiLE0Jil3PECXhcHGB hZ8kg4hwxAu3MZeCGeyFnAXp4hqNQPnt7QL0nADpD6wHccLvnAKksq8iiaAAAAAElFTkSu QmCC); padding-right: 13px; background-position: 100% 50%; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat;">TRPV1. There are a number of different that have been shown to be sensitive to different ranges of temperature and probably are responsible for our range of temperature sensation. Thus, capsaicin does not actually cause a, or indeed any direct tissue damage at all, when chili peppers are the source of exposure. The inflammation resulting from exposure to capsaicin is believed to be the result of the body's reaction to nerve excitement. For example, the mode of action of capsaicin in inducing bronchoconstriction is thought to involve stimulation of culminating in the release of neuropeptides. Essentially, the body inflames tissues as if it has undergone a burn or abrasion and the resulting inflammation can cause tissue damage in cases of extreme exposure, as is the case for many substances that cause the body to trigger an inflammatory response.

Smackledorfer:arcas: phoenixdan: One of the local radio personalities on KUPD here Phoenix ate a small amount of capsaicin. He threw up almost instantly from the heat and ended up getting burns around his mouth. Went to the ER for it. Not sure if these guys were eating the same thing. I guess everyone can have different reactions.

Huh. All this time I was led to believe that the reaction to capsaicin was basically physiological and no actual tissue damage occurred.

It causes an inflammatory response, which in turn can cause tissue damage.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capsaicin

Early research showed capsaicin to evoke a strikingly long-onset current in comparison to other chemical agonists, suggesting the involvement of a significant rate-limiting factor. Subsequently, the VR1 has been shown to be a member of the superfamily of, and as such is now referred to as http://www.genenames.org/data/hgnc_data.php?match=TRPV1" style="text-decoration: none; color: rgb(102, 51, 102); background-image: url(data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAoAAAAKCAYAAACNMs+9 AAAAVElEQVR42n3PgQkAIAhEUXdqJ3dqJ3e6IoTPUSQcgj4EQ5IlUiLE0Jil3PECXhcHGB hZ8kg4hwxAu3MZeCGeyFnAXp4hqNQPnt7QL0nADpD6wHccLvnAKksq8iiaAAAAAElFTkSu QmCC); padding-right: 13px; background-position: 100% 50%; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat;">TRPV1. There are a number of different that have been shown to be sensitive to different ranges of temperature and probably are responsible for our range of temperature sensation. Thus, capsaicin does not actually cause a, or indeed any direct tissue damage at all, when chili peppers are the source of exposure. The inflammation resulting from exposure to capsaicin is believed to be the result of the body's reaction to nerve excitement. For example, the mode of action of capsaicin in inducing bronchoconstriction is thought to involve stimulation of culminating in the release of neuropeptides. Essentially, the body inflames tissues as if it has undergone a burn or abrasion and the ...

Barricaded Gunman:Psh... I eat ghost chili peppers for breakfast. Real men prefer the merciless peppers of Quetzlzacatenengo, grown deep in the jungles primeval by the inmates of a Guatemalan insane asylum.

No, actually, they aren't. "pepper spray", what cops call Oleoresin Capsicum spray, is made with denatured alcohol and capsaicin. CS gas, "tear gas" is a synthetic chemical that is produced by a heat reaction and is in no way related to Capsaicin, and isn't even measured with Scoville units.

BTW, if you call me a coonass you better be able to find the exits all the way back to your property line. That's becoming the n-word type of thing, and I'm glad. I never did care for it.

That actually makes me a little sad, I grew up a little ways away, in Cedar Bayou, (the one outside of Houston,not the one outside of Dallas), but had a lot of friends from around the Baton Rouge area and frequently went out that way for crawfish boils and gumbo cooks and whatnot. The old folks there referred to themselves as coonass with pride, it wasn't considered the slightest bit derogatory to them.

BTW, if you call me a coonass you better be able to find the exits all the way back to your property line. That's becoming the n-word type of thing, and I'm glad. I never did care for it.

That actually makes me a little sad, I grew up a little ways away, in Cedar Bayou, (the one outside of Houston,not the one outside of Dallas), but had a lot of friends from around the Baton Rouge area and frequently went out that way for crawfish boils and gumbo cooks and whatnot. The old folks there referred to themselves as coonass with pride, it wasn't considered the slightest bit derogatory to them.

Well, those of us who don't like it (and there is a dividing line there) just kinda got tired of not being taken seriously. Bad enough being from Louisiana, but go out of state and everyone expects you to be Justin Wilson... Grinds your gears. And that farker was from Mississippi. Nobody I knew cooked like him.

BTW, if you call me a coonass you better be able to find the exits all the way back to your property line. That's becoming the n-word type of thing, and I'm glad. I never did care for it.

That actually makes me a little sad, I grew up a little ways away, in Cedar Bayou, (the one outside of Houston,not the one outside of Dallas), but had a lot of friends from around the Baton Rouge area and frequently went out that way for crawfish boils and gumbo cooks and whatnot. The old folks there referred to themselves as coonass with pride, it wasn't considered the slightest bit derogatory to them.

Yeah, I don't get that it's now some dirty word. I grew up in the 70s/80s seeing these all over the place.